at last, a photo of Kathryn/e street that is nearly visible

Here's a pretty good nother try at photographing the strange additional letter on the sign for Kathryn Street on the Metropolitan Ring Road in Melbourne.



Oh, I would so-o like to know who did it and why.

kathryn street or kathryne street?

There's a sign on the Metropolitan Ring Road in Melbourne's north, originally posted as KATHRYN STREET but altered by some brave, obstinate or foolhardy soul to say KATHRYNE STREET.

I say 'foolhardy or brave' because it is on a bridge at a busy part of this multi-lane freeway and I can't visualise how the perpetrator got to the sign to insert the small letter 'E' on the end of the sign, or, more importantly, why they wanted to do so.

As I was driving to Melbourne on this road today, near Fawkner, I was determined to get a shot of the sign. I had my passenger all set up with camera at the ready, and here's the photo:



Yes, it's a terrible shot, and we missed the sign altogether, but it was the best we could do in the thundering traffic. So, how did the writer manage to get down to the road and add a letter to the inaccessible and dangerously-situated sign? And why did he or she care about the spelling of this word?

The saga contines...

One of these days I'll get a good photo and post it, and one day I'll find out the answer to this question.

comma splices gain credibility

I've just noticed some comma splices in such a prestigious text that I'm now doubting my own ability to spot them. It's in a book called Learning to Dance: Elizabeth Jolley: Her life and Work.

As the blurb says, 'Elizabeth Jolley is one of Australia's most significant and best-loved writers'. So, if she's using comma splices they must have a role to play. I noticed them most in a short story called Paper Children. Here are a couple of examples:

Even their letters were strange, they wrote in English because Lisa had never learned to speak anything else.

Lisa tried to look forward to the visit, she knew so little about her mother, an old lady now after a life of hard work as a doctor.

The use of these constructions seems to me to give a sense of intimacy, closeness to the point of view of the two characters in the story.

And, from another story, Pear Street Dance:

No one needed to read anything, the Newspper of Claremont Street told them all the news.

I guess, now that I'm looking out for comma splices, I'm going to find them all over the place...

comma splices and a frightening and thrilling Pastworld

I've just read a novel I thoroughly enjoyed. It's called Pastworld. After a while, mainly because of the age of the main characters - 17 - I realised the book was written for young people. It's published by Bloomsbury Children's Books.

The idea underlying the plot is gripping - London, in the middle of the twenty-first century, has been bought by a mega-Corporation and turned into a huge theme park where residents and visitors live according to Victorian-era laws, morality and culture. The darker side of Victorian life (and of mega-corporations!) creates a sense of evil that provides the tension.

The book's a great read and I wonder if it might one day be made into a film.

One odd thing that struck me about the writing was that the author, Ian Beck, sometimes uses comma splices.

At first I thought it was occurring only in dialogue, which seems fine to me, as it gives a sense of the individuality of a character. Here's an example from page 84. 'At least we shall travel on a steam train, you might enjoy that.'

But there are comma splices in other places too, for instance on page 88: Lucius turned to Caleb and stopped him, he held on to his arm and said almost in a whisper...

There are many more examples of this construction.

I've heard it said that the comma splice will eventually be acceptable in English. I know that I see it often in the writing of teenagers, which makes me wonder if their writing is a sign of the times to come. I like changes in English, in language generally, because to me that's a sign of life, of change and growth. But I must say that comma splices 'twang' for me when I'm reading and take me momentarily out of the world of the writer's imagination.

Anyway, here's a great gift idea for all those writers who've already moved into the brave new world of comma splicing.

When I checked out the home page of the writer, Ian Beck, I was pleasantly surprised to realise he's the author of some of the lovely picture books I've shard with young children in the past.

a good nother idea

I'm still on the trail of the new word nother. Recently my sister said, 'That'll weigh a good nother kilo, I reckon'.

Okay... now I've heard a different word than whole inserted between an and other.

So now I think maybe our brains are processing the expression as one word rather than as a phrase. Maybe it's the word another with an infix in it.

When I looked up infix in the Merriam Webster online, I was surprised to discover it can be a transitive verb or an adjective as well as a noun. However, it seems as if we don't use infixes much in English compared to other languages.

when a gerund does the job better than another noun form

I noticed a sign on the back of a van today. It said, 'Pipe and cable locating'.



My first reaction was that it should have said, 'Pipe and cable location', as I think location is the noun that best describes what I presume this company does - scan for pipes before the client excavates.

But they used a gerund, a verb form that operates as a noun.

On reflection, I think the sign is clever, in that the gerund form creates a subtle advertisement for them as an active business that will do things for you.

a creative use of minimalist graffiti

A great use of two letters of the alphabet to transform a boring road sign into something with a message!